Friday, 28 June 2013

As a races grow in popularity, so does the cost of entering. Chip timing, online processing fees between 4 to 11 dollars add to an already inflated ($40-350) race price. Although it costs money to host a race, one can guess that hosting a race if done efficiently can be a source of revenue.

Some of this money goes to road closures, to police, to race timing services, hosting expos, and pre and post-race entertainment. Some of this money also is allocated to prize money for the winners of the race. What correlation is there, if any, between the cost of races, the number of entrants, and the prize money given to the winners? I decided see exactly how much of this money goes to the the racers.

Saturday, 15 June 2013

Runners like to measure themselves. Be it miles run, calories burned, weight gained or lost, pace, heart rate there a lot to choose from. And it seems new, "important" numbers pop up as fast as we can write them down, such as lactate thresholds or muscle fibre type. Some runners log their miles while others track their minutes. In addition, should one simultaneously track their resting and maximum heart rate? What about pace, calories burned, or bodyweight? How to choose? It's clear enough the dedicated athlete maximizes his or her information, but even the most data-oriented individuals can fall under the weight of numbers.

Compiling these metrics is not intended to clarify or rank them. What I'm hoping in gathering as many as I can is illuminating just what people consider, and is available, to measure. And it is rare to find comprehensives lists of these metrics. Therefore my main goal was to find 51 "measurable" things related to running that have been used, or recommended, by a credible source.

I present these findings in no particular order of importance, but accompanied with a brief commentary. I expect most of these metrics are familiar to almost everyone, some that only known the seasoned veterans, and a few that are relatively unknown. I've broken the list into 8 categories: Milage, Body, Shoes, Rest, Diet, Strength, Workouts, and Races.

One final warning: When including new metrics in one's melting pot pick and choose carefully. Monitoring all these variables at once is not a healthy way to train!

Saturday, 8 June 2013

Just like everyone else's life there's lots of other things going on, but it seems to have delayed writing about anything.

Irony abounds: I got overwhelmed with things to say so I stopped writing. Usually I don't know what I want to talk about until I start writing. But as storytellers go I'm not the best, so it's hard to give a good tale about the past. Instead, here's the grocery list for May.

Thee weeks later (May) I got well enough to run Bluenose half marathon. Came in second in a time of 1:11 to John Kuto, who ran in 1:09. Halifax has a lot of secretly great runners

Week after that ran two legs of the Cabot Trail relay with the Black Lungs team, a team from Toronto that I was invited to join in. (NB: The name refers to coal miners but people often think it's a group of ex-smokers). Came second in leg 2, then won leg 15. In one solid weekend there was some good male bonding to be had.

Week after that went to a friends' wedding in London, Ontario. It was effectively a class reunion of McGill Alumni, which was awesome. Open bar also great, as was seeing two longtime friends getting married.

That brings me to the present. I've also been working on a first draft of a paper for my SPARTAN project at Dalhousie. Helping guide other people's projects as well as going some of my own. During May I created the new title heading (as you'll see if you click on the link). It's a pretty sweet full-time job.

Last week I rolled the same ankle I did in April. I got mad and started pool running. Pool running is awesome, however, and after 5 days I'm almost back to normal. These guys I was running with (when I rolled the ankle) are fast guys but don't have an official club. Like I said, there's hidden talent here.

So yeah, randomly busy May/June period. I also got it into my head to maybe run the Chicago Marathon in October, health and seat sales permitting. Black Lungs people will be there, as will others. But first I must run a sub 1:11 to make the qualifying standard for a late entry (general entry is sold out). Johnny Miles is next week. Could try that one.

Also added a twitter feed to the sidebar of the site. Let's see if I can muster 140 characters now and then.

I had this personal mandate to write when I felt like I had something worth posting. I'll try to ignore that mandate as often as possible.